f/7/ 



■ffiE.i'LepxMEss 



02B 996 874 1 



A D D S E S S B Y 

Rea r A d-miral Austin M. Knight, U, S» M 

June 7th. 19 16 c 

Worcester Polytechnic In s titut e , 
Worcester, Massachusetts, 






\ 



:o,v 



D. of D. 
SEP 27 1917 



WPI 



c 



We hear much talk these days of preparedness and ef ficiency , 
— words which I have no doubt stand high in your vocabulary and 
occupy an important place in your thoughts In my remarks this 
morning I shall take these words as my text, but lest I be mis- 
understood, I hasten to say that the preparedness of which I mean 
to speak is only indirectly concerned with national defense, and 
the efficiency which I have in mind is not primarily that of the 
Army and l^avy of our own or any other- country. 

The preparedness of which I mean to speak is that type and 
measure of preparedness which you need as individuals to fit you 
for the tasks awaiting you beyond the threshold ?/hieh you cross 
to-day. The efficiency of which I speak is the personal effi- 
ciency which it is your duty to yourselves as vi/ell as to the 
world to bring to bear upon every task that comes to you as a 
part of your contribution to the world's well-being. 

But vi^hile my theme is individual, and not national, pre- 
paredness, I ask you to note that these two after all are not 
as far apart as you may be inclined to thinko 

A nation is made up of individuals and national character- 
istics are the summation of individual characteristics. So that 
'if you, as individuals, and va th no thought beyond your individ- 
ual career, prepare yourselves efficiently for that career, you 
will make a real and very valuable contribution to the prepared- 
ness of the nation as a whole. Naturally, a v/ider outlook, a 



WPI) -2- 

more generous thought for others, a recognition of your relations 
to the great whole of which you are parts, v/ill bring you far 
more helpfully into the general scheme of things and vastly in- 
crease the significance of your contribution; but the thought I 
want you to take in now is that you cannot so far -withdra?/ your- 
selves from the general scheme that what you do to make your- 
selves efficient shall not contribute something toward making 
your country efficient. And if, v/hether with or v/ithout a recog- 
nition of this fact, you strive for the highest possible effi- 
ciency, your contribution will be a great and shining one, 
whether you ever take up arms or not; for the highest ef-""Lciency 
must have character as its foundation, and character is the 
foundation also of the real greatness of a nation. Especially 
is character a factor in the efficiency of the soldier and the 
sailor, for the cornerstone of their profession is consecration 
to a cause. 

Everything, then, that makes you better engineers, if engin- 
eering be your profession, makes you better citizens and poten- 
tially more efficient defenders of your country. Until you have 
had special training, you will lack much of v/hat is needed to fit 
you for taking your place in ranks and fa.cing seasoned soldiers. 
But with your efficiency developed to the limit along the line of 
your own profession and with the resulting realization of what 



fWPlJ .5. 

effioiency means, you v/ill have a ground work upon which to build 
toward military efficiency. 

Seek special training by all means at Plattsburg Camps and 
elsev/here. But never forget that every step toward any sort of 
efficiency is a step tov/ard the highly specialized efficiency 
of the soldier and the sailor, and thus a step toward readiness 
to defend your country. 

We come then to the question, hov7 can you best proceed to 
work out your individual preparedness for the career which you 
have chosen, v/hatever that career may be. How shall you become 
efficient? 

Well, first of all, I think by being thorough in everything 
that you undertake. You need thoroughness at .this stage of your 
career far more than brilliancy of intellect, — more, even, I 
believe, than knov/ledgo, for knowledge you can always acquire, 
while habits of painstaking care will never come to you if you 
do not cultivate them from the very first. 

I sometimes think that thoroughness is becoming a lost art; 
that it is giving place to a skimming of the surface of things, 
and a willingness to accept an approximate solution of any prob- 
lem, as "near enough". Certainly the tendency is in this direc- 
tion. And it is a vicious tendency and a dangerous one. 
Especially is it dangerous in the practice of the various engin- 
eering professions to which I assume that most of you are com- 



fWPI) -4- 

mitted. In the practice of these professions you will be called 
upon to deal with problems of many types, some demanding treat- 
ment along lines definitely scientific and mathematical, others 
for treatment in the broader and less clearly defined field, of 
constructive administration; but both demanding, above all else, 
thoroughness * The result of thoroughness in your scientific 
problems will be exactness , and I urge you never to be ^^.tisfied 
with less than this. Approximation has here no place. 

As to the broader and to me the more interesting problems 
that you will meet in what I will designate broadly as your 
"field-v/ork" , I want to speak rather fully because I feel that 
here your problems and my experience overlap in a v/ay which 
should be interesting to us both. The problems that I have in 
mind as confronting the engineer in planning his work in the 
field are not unlike those confronting an officer of the Army 
o.r Navy in the planning of a campaign. 

I come to you from the Naval War College; and one of my rea- 
sons for consenting to come was that I hoped it would be possible 
for me to tell you something of interest and value about the way 
in which we handle problems there and teach the officers of the 
Navy who are our students, to handle them in practice, — as 
Commanders of fleets, of ships, and of the lesser units which 
complete our naval organization. 



(W.P.IJ -5- 

I have urged upon you the quality of thoroughness, because 
we have come to realize at the War College how easy it is to 
overlook some factor of seemingly trifling importance 7;hich later 
may manifest itself as absolutely vital. We have learned that in 
War there is no such thing as a negligible factor; and to make 
sure that none shall be treated as negligible, we have fiveloped 
a system of treating our problems which appears to us to have two 
advantages. Because it is systematic, it is to a great extent an 
assurance of thoroughness; and because it is insisted upon in the 
treatment of every problem, however simple, it develops a habit 
of mind which tends to make system and thoroughness instinctive . 
I give it to you with the hope that you may find in it something 
of practical value. 

The system finds its expression in two clear-cut formulae 
which ?;e call "The Estimate of the Situation" and the "Order 
Form," 

The Estimate of the Situation is a formal analysis of the 
conditions entering into a problem, designed to lead us logical- 
ly to a recognition of exactly what it is that we are called upon 
to do, and a decision as to exactly how we can best do it. 

There is nothing here that is peculiar to training for war 
as distinguished from other training which looks to the develop- 
ment of intellectual processes leading to definite action. 



[WFl) -6- 

Whenever v/e find ourselves confronted by a sittiation v/hich 
calls for something to be done, we pass from recognition of the 
necessity for action to the action itself by mental processes 
v/hich, often without deliberate consciousness on our part, fol- 
low a certain clearly defined course. We see the something to 
be accomplished, evaluate and balance the factors enteri^^g into 
its accomplishment, and decide upon the v/ay of going about it. 
In many, perhaps in most, cases, the something to be done is 
rather vaguely seen, the evaluation of factors involved is in- 
complete, and the decision is hasty; but the process, however 
superficial, is inevitably logical to the extent that some sort 
of decision precedes the action, some sort of an estimate pre- 
cedes the decision, and some recognition of the end to be at- 
tained precedes the estimate. 

Where great issues depend upon the action taken, as is the 
case in war and the preparation for v^^ar, it is of vital import- 
ance that the estimate should be carefully made, covering all 
phases of the situation, giving adequate recognition to facili- 
ties and to obstacles,' adjusting means to ends, and binding the 
something to be done with the decision hov7 to do it, by a thor- 
ough and logical process of reasoning. 

The "estimate of the situation", then, in its military ap- 
plication, differs from the ordinary mental processes vyhich gov- 

/ 
ern the acts of our everyday life only in this — that it is a 

/ 



(W.P.I.) -7- 

very thorough and a very raethodical course of reasoning, directed 
along lines carefully systematized vo.th a view to giving the full- 
est attainable assurance that no important factor shall be over- 
looked, and guarded from hasty and superficial treatment by the 
formality which is deliberately imparted to it in tlie teachings 
of the War College. It is a logical process which, starting with 
a mission to be accomplished and taking account if all existing 
conditions, leads up to a decision v/hich, v/hen reached, is seen 
to have resulted more or less inevitably from the mission and the 
conditions considered together. 

The first step in estimating the situation is to reach a 
perfectly clear conception of what it is that v/e are called upon 
to do. Until we have done this, it is manifestly impossible to 
decide hov; v/e will do it. And you would be surprised to know 
how rare a thing it is to find a man about to undertake a task 
who has a perfectly clear conception of what it is that is ex- 
pected of him. We insist that this, — which we call the Mis - 
sion : — shall be clearly seen, and in the solution of our prob- 
lems it is written as the first item in the Estimate of the Sit- 
uation, I think there is here a lesson for you, — the import- 
ance of knowing always the end toward v/hich you are working. It 
has been well said that "the world stands aside for the man who 
kno?/s where he is going". 



(W.P.I.) -8- 

Having fixed upon the mission, we proceed to appraise and 
balance our forces and those of the enemy, and to consider the 
courses open to both sides. 

Our enemies are more or less completely identified with 
hostile intelligences; yours, with the hardly less hostile for- 
ces of nature. The forces which we command are men and ships 
and guns and the other widely varying weapons of warfare on sea 
and land; and we can never for a moment overlook the demands 
for reinforcement and repair and supply whicli in our vocabulary 
are grouped under the comprehensive term Logistics . 

The forces which you command are all those marvellous in- 
strumentalities of modern industry and transportation which to- 
day amaze the world with their variety and their adequacy. Your 
forces, like ours, are effective only as directed by trained 
intelligence, — intelligence alert, resolute, prompt to take 
advantage of every opening presented and to force openings v/here 
none present themselves. 

Having balanced up v/hat we can do, against what the enemy 
can do, and considered wlia,t line of action points most directly 
toward the accomplishment of our mission, we are ready to make 
a decision as to what we will do. And having made the decision, 
we teach that it is right to drive this home with every ounce 
of power tlaat we command, behind it. 



(mi) -9- 

The lessons which I see for you in our formal maniier of es- 
timating a situation are, then, lessons of thoroughness, of sys- 
tem, of decision, and of habit; — the habit of logical reason- 
ing, deliberately cultivated, and tending ultimately to crystal- 
lize into something very much like instinct. 

This is the first message that I bring you from the War 
College. 

The second message has to do with the framing of orders for 
putting into effect the decision to which our estimate has led» 
Here a standard form is even more important than is» the Estimate 
of the Situation, since we are here transmit U ng our thoughts 
and our plans to others, with the- danger, inseparable from all 
such transmission from mind to mind, that there will be at some 
point an omission of essential information or instruction, or a 
failure in clearness of statement, which will be fatal to the 
full comprehension of our wishes by the one to whom their exe- 
cution is entrusted. 

The feature of our form which has most interest for you is 
that which covers the relation between superiors and subordinates; 
betv/een the one issuing the order and the one receiving it. The 
governing thought here is that the superior shall take the sub- 
ordinate into his confidence as far as practicable, in order that 
the subordinate shall know the end which his superior has in view. 



lYPI) -10- 

There is here involved a principle which, in your pro.^ession as 
in mine, has great importance, — the principle of initiative . 

No man who aims to be a leader of men, whether in v/ar or 
in industry, can afford to dispense with the initiative of those 
whom he aspires to lead. And their initiative cj.n be exerted 
helpfully only when it is intelligently directed toward an endu 
which is clearly seen, and in full cooperation with others who 
are working toward the same end. In accordance v/ith this prin- 
ciple our Order-Form provides for three perfectly definite 
parts in every order. In part 1, the authority issuing the or- 
der states briefly the situation upon whicn it is based; in 
part 2, he briefly outlines his plan for dealing v/ith the sit- 
uation; in part 3, he assigns tasks to the subordinates for 
whom the order is intended, and who are thus placed in a posi- 
tion such that all their efforts may be guided by intelligent, 
not mechanical obedience, — obedience qjiickened by initiative 
and guided by loyalty. Knowing the plans of the superior, tb.e 
subordinates are able to modify their lines of action, when 
new conditions arise, in such a way as to make them converge 
always upon the end which the superior has in view^. In such 
a recognition and utilization of the initiative and the loyal- 
ty of others, lies the whole secret of effective leadership. 

Some of you may be tempted to feel th-at I place too much 
emphasis upon what is, after all, only a form. It may well be 



(WPI) >11- 

that you do not need such a form. Indeed it has not occurred 
to me to suggest that you adopt the form as such . The form is 
not for us an end, but only a means to an end, this end being 
the transmission to a subordinate of the v/ill of a superior 
with the maximum degree of certainty and celerity which is 
practicable under conditions as they exist. 

The form has many features of convenience. It sav 3 time 
both in the writing and in the reading. It is to some extent 
an insurance against carelessness and omissioii. It furnishes, 
as has already been noted, a common ground for the meeting of 
the mind which issues the order and the one v?hich receives, 
interprets and executes it. Back of all these features of con- 
venience however, lies something which is of vastly greater 
value, and something, as it happens, which can be dissociated 
from the form and applied in many cases where no stereotyped 
form could be used. This is the spirit of which the form is 
the vehicle, — a spirit which dictates a relation betweeh 
superior and subordinate, in which the one avails himself of 
the intelligence, initiative, and loyalty of the other to for- 
ward the ends v^hich we may assume that both have equally in 
viev/. Any superior who in transmitting his orders to a sub- 
ordinate throv/s upon the task he is assigning, all the light 
in which he sees the task, — the situation froi.- ;.'hich it 
springs, the conditions which surround it, and the end at which 



it aims, — is complying v/ith the spirit of the Orde"--.H^orm. 
The orders may be carefully written out or they may be issued 
orally and instinctively to meet a situation unexpe cted\/- pre- 
sented. They will be orders in the best military sense. 

If I have m.ade myself clear as to the real significance 
of the Order Form you will understand that this significance 
has its foundation in the two great military virtues of loy- 
alty and initiative. And if you ask m.e why I have thought it 
worth v/hile to bring to this great industrial school a matter 
so intimately connected with military administration, I reply 
that I do not think of initiative and loyalty as military vir- 
tues alone, or of leadership as confined to the operations of 
war. 

Wherever the plans of a superior are to be carried out 
by subordinates, they will be more effectively carried out 
if the subordinates are in the confidence of the superior, 
familiar with conditions as he sees them, with the ends at 
v;hich he aims, and familiar also with the duties assig..ed to 
other subordinates vi^hose efforts should be coorr'^:'..ated with 
theirs and with those of the common superior. In sport, this 
coordination of effort is called "team-v/ork" and this term 
has in recent years found v/ide application not only in mili- 
tary, but in industrial, comjnercial and even in social life. 



:wpi) • -15- 

The spirit of the Orcler-j^^orm makes for team-work and th: j' it 
for the best utilization of all the energj^ of all the forces 
acting upon our problem in v/hatever field of ^. ctivity that 
problem may lie. 

I have said that loyalty is not a military virtue only. 
It is, I think, the highest of civic virtues. And I do not 
speak alone of loyalty to country. In such an audience as 
this we may safely take that for granted. But I doubt if you 
all realize how loyalty should run, like a golden thread, 
through the whole conduct of your life, and especially thro' 
all of your relations with those under whose authority you 
serve, — for I assume that in the practice of your profession 
you v/ill, for many years at least, be subject to autho..-i ty . I 
hope this may be so; for subjection to authority moans dis- 
cipline, and discipline is what men need and especially, I be- 
lieve, men and young men as we find them in this great democ- 
racy of ours. To my mind, one of the most poter^- arguments 
in favor of universal military training is that it would have 
a tendency to bring our over-sure young Americans to a recog- 
nition of the necessity for authority and the beauty and whole- 
someness of discipline. And discipline, rightly apprehended, 
.spells loyalty. I urge you, then, to cultivate loyalty to 
those whose purposes you serve, and this not alone as a matter 



7PI) 



-14- 

of ethics but as a matter of efficiency. Let their p apposes be 
your purposes. Hake their interests 5^our interests. Be ready 
always to give just a little more service than they demand. 
Avoid criticism of them and of their plans. Make your loyalty 
a matter of instinct, as well as a rule of action. 

So much for your attitude toward those above you. But 
note th^t loyalty is a virtue which works both v/ays . It looks 
down as well as up. If the interests of the employer lie in 
the hands of the employed, it is no less true that the inter- 
ests of the employed lie in the hands of the employer. And 
loyal service gives a claim to loyal recognition and support. 
So when it chances that you are vested with authority, do not 
forget that the obligation of loyalty is a mutual one as be- 
t7/een you and those subject to your orders. If you trust a 
subordinate, let him knov/ that you trust him. If he is capable 
of initiative, do not tie him down with detailed instructions. 
Above all, do not yourself insist upon doing his ?;-ork i... addi- 
tion to your own. Make his area of discretion as wide as his 
ability justifies and then refuse to encroach upon it. In 
trusting him, you will make him worth3^ of trust. If your tem- 
perament is such that you have no confidence in others, you 
are not likely to have confidence in yourself. 

Loyalty has still another phase, — Lhat in which its ob- 
ject is the task in hand. Be loyal to your work. Go out to 



^.P.I.) -15- 

meet it. Insist that you can do it. If your tO'-'ls are inade- 
quate let the skill v/ith which you use them compensate ;'or their 
defects. Never let any one think that you anticipate failure. 
Believe in yourself and others will believe in you. An air of 
confidence is a tremendous asset. 

I'Vhat I have said to you thus far has to do with material 
success. It is this, I assume , upon v^rhich your thoughts are 
chiefly fixed to-day. 

It is well that it should be so. And yet I v/ould have you 
remember that material success is after all not the highest suc- 
cess. Certainly it is not the type of success whic?a makes most 
surely for happiness. I am not here to preach a sermon. I am 
here to tell you as frankly as I can, what appears to me after 
many years of experience and observation, the road v.-hioh offers 
you the maximum prospect of satisfaction when yoi:. reach the 
point of vieviT which I occupy to-day, and look back upon the 
life to which you now look forward. 

The wonderful thing about youth is that it ''•:^3 to some 
slight extent the power to shape the future. The melancholy 
thing about age is that it cannot change a single feature of 
the past. Your object, then, should be to so plan your fu- 
ture now, that v;hen it has taken on the inexorable fixity of 
the past, you may look back upon it — I will not say without 



(WPI) 



-16- 



regret, but surely without shame and without too much of sad- 
ness. When that time comes, you will, I am convinced, think 
more of v/hat you have been, than of v;hat 370U have done; more 
of v/hat you have made, of yourselves than of what you have made 
of your fortunes* 

I would not have you understand me as contending that 
worldly success is not desirable, or that there is any element 
of unworthiness in aspiring to it. 1 trust that I have already 
made it clear how earnestl3" I urge you to strive for it. Am- 
bition is unworthy only v^hen it seeks unworthy ends, cr seeks 
its ends ,. whatever they may be, by means which are unv/orthy. 
Especially is ambition fine when it points the way to great 
constructive work such as that for which your education here 
has been a preparation. To build a great bridge i^av be a finer 
thing than to preach a great sermon or to write a great poem 
if only there enter into the conception of the bridge something 
of the spirit that makes the great sermon and the great poem, 
in their fields, constructive works also; — something, I mean, 
of the unselfishness which glories in the bridge as a contribu- 
tion to the welfare of mankind rather than as a triumph for the 
individual, VJe often call the 7/0 rid unjust. Certainly it is 
not al'ways discriminating. But after all, does it mabter so 
much in the long run? I doubt it more eiiij. more as I grow older. 



TI) -17- 

In the Navy, as you know, we have never any pro st got of 
brilliant revYard in a worldly sense and it sometimes seems 
that even the rewards which we have a right to expect are 
very unfairly distributed. But I am not sure that this is so. 

I have come to believe that in the IJavy there is only one 
reward to which an officer can look with any confidence, and 
that this reward iz practically unfailing. It is the confid- 
ence and esteem of his fellow officers. And I believe that 
much the same thing is true in civil life. Your fellov/s know 
you for "What you are, and, in the main, esteem you accordingly. 
If, by ability, industry, and above all, by character, you win 
their confidence and their admiration, you will not have failed, 
even tho' you may have missed the highest rewards in v/ealth and 
in that sort of honor which the ¥/orld accords to its favorites. 
In other v/ords, you v/ill in a very real and satisfactory sense 
have succeeded if you have deserved success. 

And now, before I close, I want to get away for a moment 
from all questions of efficiency and success, and to say a 
few V70rds pitched on quite another key. 

All that I have said thus far has been conn.ojed with your 
obligation to others; — to the world, to your country, to your 
profession, to your friends, I want to speak now about your 
obligation to yourselves; and I justify the importance which 



fWPI) _18. 

I attach to this by the fact that after all that has 'been said 
and all that can be said, of your relation to others, your re- 
lation to yourselves raust be your chief concern; that thro' 
whatever length of years it may be given you to live, you must 
live in unbroken companionship v/ith yourselves. Rich or poor, 
successful or unsuccessful, in crov^rded streets or in the lone- 
liness of the forest or the sick-room, you must endure uninter- 
ruptedly, association with your own personality, comm_union with 
your own thoughts, 

Hovi/ v;ise then, to make that personality attractive, those 
thoughts rich in capacity for stimulation, for amusem.ent, or 
for repose, according to the demands of widely varying environ- 
ment and more widely varying moods. 

Every one of us is called upon to lead two lives; — one 
for others, one for himself. You have no lack of advisers who 
urge you to make the first of these lives useful . I charge 
you, now, to make the other life happy. Give much to the 
world, — yes. Add all that you may to the sum of human wisdom. 
Give lavishly to those who look to you for help and sympathy 
and counsel. But save something for yourself. Keep a corner 
of your soul in which to lay up a little treasure for your 
very own. Let this t^ke no account of utility. You have 
learned much of practical things at this wonderfully practical 



WPI) -19- 

school. Learn something no'N of things unpractical. 

You have given much thought to science and mathematics and 
to all things that appeal to the intellect. Give some thought 
now and from time to time hereafter to those things which ap- 
peal to the spirit, — to literature, and especially to poetry 
if there is anything in your nature v/hich responds to the charm 
of poetry, — to music, to art, to anything which has the power 
to lift you temporarily above the material things of your v^^ork- 
a-day life and into an atmosphere v/here you can find yourself 
alone with your ideals , your aspirations, and your intimate, 
personal tastB's. 

I put poetry first among the elements I have named, be- 
cause to me it stands as the antithesis of all things practical 
and therefore as best suited for a foil to sMch things. Also, 
perhaps, because in my own experience, thro' the years of a long 
and busy life, I have found it, in times of storm and stress, a 
source of rest and refreshment 'far beyond anything that I can 
picture to you to-day. Its possibilities of helpfulness are 
enormously increased by the fact that you can carry it in your 
memory and so have it always at your command. 

To those of you, then, who have a taste for poetry, I say, 
saturate your hearts with its spirit, your m_emory with its lines, 
your ears with its music; and when you have done this, you will 



(WPI) 



-20- 



:or 



have furnished the intimately personal corner of your life f( 
which I am urging consideration, with a v/ealth of material upon 
which you can draw through all the years that lie before you, 
with the certainty that the more you draw upon it the richer and 
fuller it will become. • 

If poetry makes no appeal to you, I urge you to search your 
hearts for other sources from which to draw the port of inspira- 
tion which we who are more fortunate, find there. The field of 
literature is wide and varied and full of charm, and there are 
other fields, in some one of v/hich sure 13^ you may find what you 
need to take you from time to time out of the more or less dreary 
routine of material efficiency. 

I might hesitate to urge this view upon you if I were less 
convinced than I am that your efficiency will in the long run be 
increased if it is occasionally laid aside in favor of occupa- 
tions which aim at nothing more concrete than enjoyment unadul- 
terated by any thought of practical utility. You will have 
your athletics, of course, and here you v/ill find much that is 
restful. But I have failed entirely in what I have tried to 
express if I have not made it clear that the sort of re si; which 
I have now in mind has in it an element of spiritual refresh- 
ment by virtue of which it is contrasted as sharply v/ith 
athletics as v/ith the dullest of routine labor. It belongs to 



-21- 



f 

^our inner self; to that life of which I have spoken '-s that 
which you must live for yourselves and for yourselves alone« 



(a.m.k.) 

(6/15/16 



LIBRARY OF CONGRE 



iiiiiiiiiiiiliilil 

029 996 874 



f/7/ 



iiiiia 

029 996 874 



